Posted on 10/10/2005 5:29:49 PM PDT by Stellar Dendrite
The White House called me about 45 minutes before the president publicly announced his choice of Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court. We had heard the week before that Harriet Miers was one of three people under serious consideration. The problem was, no one knew much about her.
We subsequently were told that she attended an evangelical Church in Dallas, which had strong views on social issues. Still, as I told the White House, the nomination comes down to "trust me" from the president.
I explained that I had witnessed five "trust-me" pleas regarding presidential nominees for the Supreme Court and none has worked out right.
Senator Gordon L. Allott, for whom I worked when President Richard M. Nixon nominated Circuit Judge Harry A. Blackmun, had some problems with the Blackmun's record. As a member of the Senate leadership who visited the White House weekly, Senator Allott mentioned his concern to the president.
Nixon told Allott, "Trust me. Harry Blackmun will turn out to be a carbon copy of [Chief Justice] Warren E. Burger." My guess is the president said that because he knew Senator Allott and Chief Justice Burger were good friends. Anyway, the Stevens appointment didn't quite turn out that way.
I also recall President Gerald R. Ford reassuring Senator James A. McClure that Judge John Paul Stevens was a good Republican and would vote like a good Republican. Maybe that is Ford's idea of how a good Republican would vote. It certainly is not mine.
And then there was the Kenneth Starr memo asking us to trust the Reagan White House. Sandra Day O'Connor was a conservative Republican, so the memo contended. Jane Hurst, then Free Congress Foundation Chairman, alleged that Starr had misrepresented the truth.
Then there was the White House conference call with Anthony M. Kennedy's priest who assured the Reagan White House that Kennedy's strong Catholic upbringing would cause him to vote right on social issues. The Kennedy appointment hasn't quite worked out that way.
Reagan White House Chief of Staff, former New Hampshire Governor John H. Sununu, and three-term former New Hampshire Governor Meldrim Thompson, arguably the most right-wing politician ever to have served in statewide office in modern times, scolded me for joining with Howard Phillips in opposing the nomination of Judge David H. Souter. Thompson told me he would stake his career on the idea that we would love David H. Souter on the Supreme Court. None turned out to be right. A sixth nominee was a bridge too far.
Representative Tom DeLay (R-TX), fighting for his political life, said while he agrees that "trust me" should not be acceptable in considering a nominee for the High Court, "this president deserves the benefit of the doubt."
It is true; President George W. Bush has nominated some of the finest people ever to serve on the federal judiciary. And Bush says Harriet Miers was responsible for finding many of those judicial nominees. The president says, "She knows what I want in a federal judge."
No doubt. But you don't get promoted in the Bush White House by dissenting from the president. It still doesn't tell us about her positions on issues or about her experience.
Washington Post reporter Dan Balz asked me why the Right was disappointed in the Harriet Miers nomination. In one of 27 interviews I did from 7 a.m. to 8:15 p.m. Eastern in a single day, I told Baltz that expectations were high.
After stealth candidate Judge John G. Roberts, Jr. was appointed chief justice, the conservative movement thought the president would nominate someone from among a number of well-qualified federal appeals court judges. There are women, there are Hispanics, there is a black woman.
Whatever the president was looking for was on the federal bench. There are many well-qualified scholars waiting in the wings as well.
What bothered Conservatives with whom I spoke or corresponded was that Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-NV) had recommended Harriet Miers to the president as a judicial nominee who easily could be confirmed. One prominent Conservative noted, "Harry Reid got his candidate. When do we get ours?"
It doesn't bother me that Reid has recommended Miers. Senator Reid knows Miers and has worked with her but he might not know her judicial philosophy any better than we do.
It also doesn't bother me that in 1988 Miers contributed to the Presidential Campaign of Vice President Albert Gore, Jr. Back then, nearly everyone in Texas was a Democrat. And Al Gore, believe it or not, ran as the more conservative presidential candidate that year, although he had repudiated his pro-life stance, recognizing that to get the Democratic Nomination, pro-life views are out of the question.
Frankly, it bothers me more to learn that as a Dallas City Council member, Miers reversed a high-profile position she had taken after a day of controversial votes and lobbying. Years ago, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas said, "Don't just look for Conservatives to put on the High Court. Look for people who are conservative and have fought the wars and have survived." Miers has not.
If the Supreme Court appears to be an ivory tower where a Justice is subjected to no pressure and thus can vote at will, you are mistaken. Supreme Court Justices face almost as much pressure as legislators.
The national media plays an important role in pressuring the Judiciary. What would the editorial board of the New York Times think if a justice voted a different way on cases that were important to many justices? What about Miers? I am afraid she is pretty much on her own, as the president has given her as much support as he can.
Some evangelical leaders favor the Miers candidacy but this is based more upon the fact that Miers is the first evangelical to be nominated to the High Court since 1931 rather than because they know how she would vote.
Miers was raised Roman Catholic and found Christ in the late 1970s, according to one evangelical acquaintance. Since conservative Catholics are part of the Bush coalition, the White House would be ill-advised to discuss her conversion too loudly.
How Meirs does in the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings could determine whether she gets confirmed. If she does well, the Senate floor vote could be at least 70-30. If she doesn't and the Democrats decide to oppose her nomination, a single "no" vote cast by a Republican, in effect, could kill the nomination.
Potential no votes on the Senate Judiciary Committee are those of Senators Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Tom Coburn (R-OK). My guess is both senators could end up voting for Miers, but it is not certain.
I promised the White House that if I am satisfied with the hearings I'll support her as well. Unfortunately, not before.
That among other of his views would have made him a mixed bag pick as well.
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I think it is fair to wait until after the hearings to approve or not.
Please add me to your ping list.
Thank you!
He didn't have to.
I wouldn't call John Roberts, Pricilla Owens, Janice Rogers Brown, Michael McConnell, Edith Brown Clement and Bill Pryor trust me picks.
So if W didn't call them 'trust me' picks and I didn't call them 'trust me' picks, why did you insinuate that in your first post to me?
Which has a greater bearing on the future of this country? Scotus or a lower court appointment? Which can afford a mere 'trust me' and which can't?
These are "the facts of this issue" that you are callously avoiding.
Are you sticking with "Bottomline, it's a done deal," as your response or can you lift your head out of the vat of KoolAid long enough to string a few words together in your defense?
Obviously you're not paying attention.
Lorlee Bartos managed Miers first and only campaign for elected office to the Dallas City Council in 1989. Bartos says that Miers is pro-life. Miers good friend Judge Nathan Hecht also says that she is pro-life.
You do not know that, you believe that and why? Because you trust GWB - I trust him too, but he is not an ideologue, he is not a Ronald Reagan, he more like a CEO, he runs things and looks for the path of least resistance, he runs things and 9/11 brought out the best in him.
In a little over two years from now he will be retired and I will live with his SCOTUS picks for the rest of my life. He promised bona fides and he is delivering ghosts.
"I think it is fair to wait until after the hearings to approve or not."
This nomination *will* go through.
The hearings wont tell us much, she will likely invoke the ginsburg rule on matters that will come before the court. Even still, regardless of what she answers or not-- we simply cant tell if she will drift leftward within 5-10 years.
Such is life.
Be back at 11am pst.
The other issue of not using our "bench strength" also has validity. Bush should have sent a clear message by nominating a known conservative. I don't care if it would take 3-4 nominations to get a real conservative approved-- do it! This sets a precedent that conservatives deserve to nominate conservatives, and see them approved. When Stevens or Ginsburg retires, we want to have the media and liberals *expecting* a hard-core conservative like Luttig or Owens to be nominated to replace them. They need to be shown that the right to govern is won in elections, not by engaging in hysterical rhetoric and media manipulation.
Liberals are *still* the largest voting block on the Supreme Court, with 4 reliable votes (Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer-- though Breyer has actually made a few surprisingly conservative decisions in recent years). Kennedy is a "moderate", who has voted liberal on several crucial cases. We've lost Rehnquist, and no one is sure that John Roberts will be as conservative as he was. Therefore, it's crucial that we get another proven conservative on the court.
If Roberts turns out to be a true conservative, we will still only have 3 conservatives on the Court. Kennedy will never be reliable. The slot opened up by O'Connor won't give us a reliable majority even if Miers (or her possible replacement) makes us all happy. But a mistake with Miers' nomination will set us back 15 years.
Some Freepers seem to think this is enough to guarantee that Miers is a good pick. I don't.
There's two ways to read it. But the most probable way to read it is that Miers KNOWS WHAT THE PRESIDENT WANTS, is a good servant and team player, and therefore comes up with the candidates that fit the bill. That does NOT mean that Miers necessarily approves of those particular candidates herself. She is merely doing the job of turning up people who fit the job description she was given.
That's also, seemingly, how she got ahead in the corporate law world: Doing what her bosses needed to be done. She's very good at that. But what are her own views and convictions? We simply don't know.
>>>>You do not know that, you believe that and why?
See my RE:#86.
"Lorlee Bartos managed Miers first and only campaign for elected office to the Dallas City Council in 1989. Bartos says that Miers is pro-life. Miers good friend Judge Nathan Hecht also says that she is pro-life."
"It is the responsibility of every generation to be true to the founders' vision of the proper role of the courts in our society. If confirmed, I recognize that I will have a tremendous responsibility to keep our judicial system strong, and to help ensure that the courts meet their obligations to strictly apply the laws and the Constitution."
-Harriet Miers Acceptance Speech
That's all I have to go by. And PresBush`s personal knowledge of what kind of person Harriet Miers is.
In a way, this second paragraph is begging the question, undermining Weyrich's whole point. We've witnessed appointment after appointment go sour. Haven't they all come from the federal bench? Granted, by itself that's not sufficient, but if something keeps failing why do the same thing again?
For the record, I'm not necessarily pro-Miers, but just feel the need to stand up to the public crucifixion until we at least know a little more about her.
freeper jdhljc169 pinged this link:
http://stopmiersnow.com/
My point exactly - broken record, over and over, etc. So why not try something new, like nominating someone other than a judge?
I agree, the squishy liberal Senate Republicans are despicable. But I am not sure they are entirely at fault.
Some are saying that the President would have preferred to choose someone other than Miers, but he could not count on the support of Senators such as McCain and Specter. But the President says that Miers is the best choice. Could it be that he means it?
Or to put it another way, perhaps George W. Bush agrees with John McCain and Arlen Specter on most, if not all issues. That would explain why the President campaigned for Senator Specter. And why the President did not veto McCain-Feingold.
Can anyone name a policy over which George W. Bush and John McCain seriously disagree?
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